>> Have been delayed extensively and now arrive during a week typically reserved for crap

The bright side of the generally less painful “Seventh Son” is that it’s nearly half an hour shorter than “Jupiter,” and the blatant mediocrity of its PG-13-rated adventure better matches the story. It’s still lousy and a movie that’s hard to believe anyone was passionate enough about to write/make/finish, but it’s the difference between eliciting a shrug or a scowl.

Employing the “Maybe my character should talk like he has peanut butter in his mouth” style of acting, Bridges plays Master Gregory, a “spook” who receives more regard in this bland fantasyland than he’s earned. Though all of Gregory’s former apprentices have been killed, Tom (Ben Barnes, reminiscent of Jim Sturgess and nearly as useless) accepts the position because he can’t deny that he’s the seventh son of the seventh son. Why this matters, and why Gregory expects Tom to be seven times stronger than a normal man, is mentioned as a fact no one should question. Thus, no one asks Gregory why he doesn’t ditch his new, unimpressive disciple and find the eighth son of the eighth son, who presumably would be a lot tougher.

This leads to generic battles involving dragons and swords via the loud, dusty imagery of a junky movie that seems like it’s based on a video game but isn’t. (“Seventh Son” comes from Joseph Delaney’s novel “The Spook’s Apprentice.”) Gregory and Tom seek to take down Mother Malkin (Julianne Moore, half-asleep), an evil witch/occasional dragon who’s also aunt to Alice (Alicia Vikander), a half-witch smitten with Tom for twinkly reasons. For what it’s worth, Vikander (“Anna Karenina”) delivers the movie’s only credible performance.

Yes, the exposition-heavy “Seventh Son” reunites “Big Lebowski” costars Bridges and Moore, but as Tom survives several massive falls and a variety of monsters and spirits attack, viewers will think of everything from “The Fugitive” to “Lord of the Rings” to every other comparable, forgettable fantasy when “Son” pops up on TNT. As the Dude would say, that’s a bummer, man.

Every year brings a lot of terrible movies. These were the worst of the worst. Note: The order doesn't really matter.